The extended economic crisis is hitting almost everyone, including hospitals, which were once considered recession-proof.
Volunteers logged more than 132,000 hours at Washington Regional Medical Center in Fayetteville, Mercy Medical Center in Rogers and Northwest Medical Centers in Springdale and Bentonville, helping the hospitals stretch shrinking budgets.
Volunteers have helped soften the blow to the tune of $2.7 million.
Independent Sector reports the national price of a volunteer hour is $20.25. Independent Sector is a nonpartisan coalition of approximately 600 organizations aimed at strengthening the charitable community.
While volunteers cannot fi ll positions once held by paid employees because of the Fair Labor Standards Act, they provide services that would otherwise be performed by a paid employee.
“A volunteer may be able to do part of the duties of the paid person, but it can’t be the same job description,” said Julia Hunt, 2009 president of the Chicago-based Association for Healthcare Volunteer Resource Professionals.
Hunt also serves as the director of volunteer services at Integris Southwest Medical Center in Oklahoma City.
Washington Regional volunteers provided 35,000 hours of service representing $665,000 to the hospital last year, said Bill Rogers, executive director of the Washington Regional Foundation in Fayetteville. He figured the local volunteer hour to be worth $19.
“That’s vital,” he said. “The auxiliary is the heart and soul of the hospital. We would not be where we are today without their service.”
The foundation is the fundraising arm of Fayetteville’s Washington Regional and volunteers work through the auxiliary.
Washington Regional is the only not-for-profit, community-owned and operated hospital in Washington and Benton counties.
Michelle Bass, director of compliance and customer relations at Mercy Medical Center in Rogers, said volunteers enhance what employees do, not replace them.
“Employees have the opportunity to provide better services to patients and families with the time volunteers give us,” she said.
Volunteer Faces
If volunteers weren’t available, hospitals would likely have to pay someone to perform that same duty, said Jimmie Beauchamp, director of volunteer services at Washington Regional.
Beauchamp oversees about 120 active volunteers, with an average age of 77 years old. Her youngest volunteer, not counting student volunteers, is 49 years old.
The average age of the 110 volunteers at Springdale Northwest is about 70 and they contribute about 40,000 annual hours, said Lesa Tucker, volunteer coordinator for the hospital.
Bentonville Northwest has about 160 volunteers, with about 30 performing duties outside the hospital, said Laura Whitaker, the hospital’s volunteer coordinator.
She said the in-house volunteers contribute about 2,000 hours a month; it is hard to count volunteer time for those working outside the hospital’s walls.
Whitaker has student volunteers who work in the gift shop on the weekends. Other than those, the ages range from the mid-50s to upper-80s.
“My eldest volunteer is 87 or 88 and she loves it,” Whitaker said. “She is here two or three days a week. She says that’s what keeps her going.”
Mercy Medical Center in Rogers has a roster of 174 active volunteers who contributed 33,103 hours from Oct. 1, 2008, to Oct. 1, 2009, Bass said.
Mercy’s volunteers range in age from 20 up to the late 80s. Bass said the average age is in the late-50s to the early-60s.
Bass has seen an increase in male volunteers with an average age somewhere in the 60s.
The high average age is not unusual because volunteers don’t usually have free time until they are retired and seeking something productive to do, Hunt said.
Mike Meeks, vice president of human resources at Northwest Health System, said another value in having retired people volunteering is they share the hospital’s mission with their social circle. “We want to get the message out that we are a caring organization,” Meeks said. “Volunteers go a long way carrying the message out in the community.”
Beauchamp also said volunteers are a great recruiting tool. They talk to people they know, and volunteer needs are spread by wordof-mouth.
She said volunteers often want to give back because of great care they or a loved one received.
Northwest in Bentonville has an extensive at-home volunteer network who perform such duties as knitting baby caps to making blankets for the underprivileged.
Mercy also has at-home volunteers who knit baby caps for newborns in the nursery.
Many hospitals have a junior volunteer program for high school students that normally runs in the summer or on weekends. Some of those students will stay with the hospital after finishing the program.
Pre-med students also fi ll volunteer roles, oftentimes in the emergency departments.
Tucker said it helps the college students when it comes time to fill out medical school applications. It also gives the students some patient contact.
Beauchamp said the premed students are usually only at the hospital for a semester at time, but volunteering augments their education.
“We love our volunteers,” Meeks said. “I’ve worked with volunteers for a lot of years, and the value of them is incalculable.”
Volunteer Duties
The role of volunteers don’t vary much from hospital to hospital and have changed little over the years. Staffing the front desk, running gift shops and transporting patients are among the main services provided.
Tucker said her volunteers have very little patient contact.
Beauchamp echoed that sentiment, saying volunteers don’t deal with patient care but have a lot of contact with the public.
Rogers said volunteers work in 10 different areas of Washington Regional including staff support.
Many hospitals also provide transportation from parking lots to the hospital doors.
Mercy was able to start that service after receiving a donation of four electric cars that were used as shuttles at Pinnacle Hills Promenade when it first opened. When that service was discontinued, Mercy received the vehicles.
A unique volunteering opportunity at Northwest Medical Center-Springdale is the Guest House.
The Guest House is a suite of hotel-style rooms on the fifth floor of the hospital where patients’ family and friends can stay. The project is run by the auxiliary with volunteers staffing the desk, providing guest relations and performing all other duties required in running a hotel.
The Guest House contains seven rooms with a cost of $45 a night.
“It lets people be with loved ones without ever having to leave the hospital,” Tucker said.
Northwest has a thrift shop as well as a gift shop, which is also run by volunteers. Tucker said the foot traft c at the thrift shop has increased which requires more volunteers.
She said it may have to do with the economy, and she would like to have the shop open every Saturday. It is open two Saturday mornings a month, and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. during the week.
Whitaker said the Bentonville hospital’s gift shop is special.
“We have a wonderful, wonderful gift shop,” she said. “We have people that come in to the hospital just to go to the gift shop.”
Volunteers are found throughout the hospital from the parking lot providing shuttle service, to the front door acting as greeters to the intensive care until.
“It takes a very special person to work in the ICU, dealing with critical patients,” Whitaker said.
That is why Whitaker likes working with volunteers.
“They are here because they want to be here,” she said. “They are not here to get an award. They want to give back and be part of the community. This is their community.”
Volunteer Opportunities
Hospital volunteers go through a similar hiring process as paid employees.
“They are a part of our hospital team,” Tucker said.
At Northwest, volunteers must fill out an application and undergo a background check and drug test. Volunteers must be 18 years old, unless they are part of one of the youth programs.
Tucker said once that process is completed, she tries to match the volunteers wants with the hospital’s needs.
For Whitaker, getting a six month to a year commitment is vital. With all the time and costs associated with the application process, she said it’s just not worth if for someone only wanting to volunteer three or four months.
Washington Regional has a similar process.
Beauchamp said the volunteer application is on the hospital’s Web site. She said once the application is filled out, they have a one-on-one meeting to see what the volunteer’s goals are and if they have time to commit. Then comes tuberculosis screening, a drug test and personalized training.
“We do the on-on-one training until the volunteer feels comfortable to do it alone,” she said.
Bass said Mercy’s process is similar.
“We want volunteers to learn the structure of the auxiliary,” she said. “They go through a very similar orientation that co-workers go through.”
Mercy’s volunteers must also have a tuberculosis test and training begins.
Once volunteers are approved to work, most give it their all.
“Our volunteers take their jobs seriously,” Beauchamp said. “They are a member of our team and we are all working toward the same goal.”